Barnestorming: As the economy reopens common sense needs to prevail

Saturday

With all kinds of angry people storming statehouses to demand their favorite Starbucks be reopened, as we head toward restarting the economy, we all need to use some common sense.

Businesses need to be reopened when it is safe to reopen them. It has been tough on all of us, but COVID-19 is an awful virus, and those who do not believe it are foolish and selfish.

I am sure what state officials are doing right now is taking a hard look at businesses that can be operated safely, and deciding when they should be reopened. The pandemic is not going to be gone when we reopen businesses. That is a sad fact we must accept. We may not see the end of it this year and into next. We may never see the end of it.

Knowing this, businesses that reopen need to do everything they can and more to keep customers and staff safe. Respect your customers and your employees.

One type of business that has jumped ahead of the line is gun shops. They are expected to open their doors as early as this weekend after a federal judge ruled that Gov. Charlie Baker's order to keep them closed during the pandemic infringed on Second Amendment rights.

I question the judge's logic a bit. I am not sure that not being able to buy more guns really infringes on the right to keep and bear the arms you already have, but that is an argument for another time. From purely a common sense perspective, gun shops are exactly the type of business that could operate safely, if the owners take the pandemic seriously, and use common sense. Many gun stores are small. They do not generally have a flood of customers packed inside looking for guns and ammunition. They could get a lot of activity this weekend, but it should calm down.

To prove they are not just about rights, but respect for the health and safety of their customers and staff, gun shop owners need to take simple steps. They should limit how many people are inside at any time, require everyone - workers and customers - to wear masks (some might actually like wearing a cowboy bandana,) and keep the businesses obsessively clean. Cleanliness is a good practice in general, but during this crisis, it is crucial.

It is just traditional American common sense. The gun shops have a customer base they are hoping to maintain. Right now, keeping customers healthy is as important to the future of a business as the desire of gun owners to buy more guns. Doctors working in local hospitals, say the coronavirus is amazingly infectious. It doesn't take much to spread the virus, and the symptoms can be life-threatening.

When the lawsuits were first filed in the state to overturn the governor's ban on gun shops and shooting ranges, I told a friend who was involved with challenging it that I disagreed with the idea that gun shops were essential businesses. I still do. I also told him that essential or not, I believe they can be run safely if common sense prevails. If people get off their high horses, stop talking about rights over health safety, they could make it work. The same is true for shooting ranges. Probably more than many other businesses shooting ranges could be operated if the owners held themselves and their employees to a high standard of common sense.

The coronavirus took all of us by surprise. Even months into it, there is difficulty understanding what is safe and what is not. As the pandemic abates, the state needs to gather smart people and begin planning to deal with future crises. The decisions made on what is essential and what is not were challenging and state officials had to decide in a hurry. Some of the most essential businesses, like grocery and department stores, proved to be among the most dangerous. What happened in Walmart in Worcester was a real wake-up call. The store was shut down for cleaning after 23 employees tested positive for COVID-19, but after all employees were tested, the number grew to 81. It is almost frightening to think that so many people handling groceries and other products in the store were sick with the aggressive virus. After the news broke, many people said that all stores, not just Walmart, but also grocery and hardware stores, should test their employees.

So far that does not seem to be happening, but it is worth the discussion.

When all this is over, or even nearly over, there needs to be a discussion about how to do things better. What worked well, what went wrong and what can change before the next crisis hits. All are worth talking about. There should be a national commitment to get it right next time. We need to understand how we can make our society safe to operate in a crisis. We need to fully understand how people think, businesses operate and what is really safe.

I think all of us want the economy to reopen, whether it is to buy ammunition for target shooting and turkey hunting, for a chance to hangout in our favorite coffee shop in downtown Worcester, or just to go out to dinner with our long socially distanced families and friends. It is important for our personal well-being, and for our economic security. It should happen as soon as it can, but not a minute before. Too many people have died from this virus, and too many got sick and suffered weeks of agony, before recovering. Out of respect for them and the people who are still at-risk, reopening the economy needs to be done with common sense.